New Delhi : The Communist Party of India (Marxist) on Sunday expressed disappointment that the Central government has appointed non-political persons as interlocutors for Jammu and Kashmir suggesting that the task has to be done by a political group. “The Central Committee expressed its disappointment at the appointment of a group of interlocutors for Jammu and Kashmir who are non-political persons. If the political process is to be taken seriously, there has to be a political group which can initiate the dialogue process,” the Central Committee said at the conclusion of its three-day meeting here.
Report on J&K adopted
“The meeting discussed and adopted a report on the J&K problem which deals with the historical background of the issue and spells out the party approach for a political solution for the Kashmir issue,” party general secretary Prakash Karat said at a press conference.
It also noted that no steps were taken to remove the security structures, which were oppressing the people in the Kashmir Valley. It said though the eight-point initiative of the Centre talked about a review of the Disturbed Areas Act in force, nothing had been done in that direction.
Commenting on the recent arrest of the absconding Asimanand, main accused in the Hyderabad Mecca Masjid blast, he said this was further confirmation of the fact that some extremist Hindutva elements were responsible for terrorist activities. He said a probe should be held to uncover the full network. The argument of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh that Hindu religious figures and its activists were being framed for political reasons was disproved by the hard facts and evidence that had emerged. Noting that inflation remained at 8.5 per cent and prices of food items continued to rise, the Central Committee reiterated its demand that the deregulation of petrol prices be scrapped and speculation on foodgrains and essential commodities through futures trading be prohibited. The party will oppose the Seeds Bill, which was against the interests of the farmers and in favour of the multinational companies and corporates. The party units will also launch a campaign on eight issues, including opposing the entry of Foreign Direct Investment in retail trade.
Obama visit
The party said the purpose of the visit of U.S. President Barack Obama was to promote American business and commercial interests and draw India into a military and security relationship. It said opening up Indian agriculture and retail trade to American multinational corporations would be detrimental to the interests of crores of small and marginal farmers and small retail shop owners and traders. It also said the Manmohan Singh government seemed to be falling in step with the geopolitical strategy of the United States in order to earn the U.S. endorsement for India's permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council. “There is glee at the U.S. endorsement but Japan has been waiting for several years after endorsement,” Mr. Karat said, adding that permanent membership for India in the Security Council had to be on the basis of its independent role and influence when the United Nations structure was democratised.
(Courtesy : www.thehindu.com, 22/11/2010)
India equates Jammu & Kashmir with Tibet?
Wuhan : Barely a month ahead of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao’s visit to India next month, New Delhi has made it clear that it expects Beijing to set the record straight on Jammu & Kashmir by reciprocating just the way India has done in the case of Chinese sensitivities in Tibet and Taiwan. This was conveyed by External Affairs Minister S M Krishna to his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi in the course a 70-minute bilateral conversation on the margins of the Russia-India-China trilateral meet here on Sunday.
However, Yang continued to be ambiguous in his response and did not even raise the issue of New Delhi having frozen high-level military exchanges after Beijing conveyed that the Northern Army Commander would have to be considered for a stapled visa as he is in-charge of a “disputed area”. Giving out details of these talks, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao put it bluntly on record: “Our minister (Krishna) referred to the need to show mutual sensitivity and that the Chinese side needs to be sensitive to our concerns in J&K like India has been sensitive to Chinese concerns on Taiwan and Tibet.”
(Courtesy : www.indianexpress.com, 15/11/2010)
Separatists aghast as UN drops mention of J&K as a dispute news
One may be forgiven for mixing ones metaphors by describing separatists from the mountainous state of Jammu & Kashmir as at sea –but that would best describe their condition as news began to spread that the United Nations had dropped mention of Jammu & Kashmir as a ''dispute.'' While yesterday they were still floating on a hope and prayer, that the UN's turnaround may have been an oversight of some kind, just as the Pakistani representative at the UN had suggested, today it turned it really bad for them as the technicalities of this decision by the UN emerged.
For the record it may be stated that the United Nations has indeed dropped mention of Jammu & Kashmir as a long-pending international ''dispute.'' On Monday, Pakistan's envoy Amjad Sial told the General Assembly debating the annual report of the UNSC that the absence of the J&K issue was "inadvertent". ''We understand this was an inadvertent omission, as Jammu & Kashmir is one of the oldest disputes on the agenda of the Security Council,'' Sial said during a discussion in the General Assembly on Security Council reforms.
He was taking objection to the fact that Kashmir did not figure in the latest annual report of the Security Council to the General Assembly. It now emerges that the ''India-Pakistan question'' has not been figuring in the annual reports of the Security Council since 2000. It was from this point of time that old issues before the council stopped being mentioned in the report if they were not discussed that year.
(Courtesy : www.domain-b.com, 16/11/2010) Outdated info on govt websites in J-K
Srinagar: If you go by the official website of the Jammu and Kashmir government, the state has only 14 districts as against 22. Official websites of the state government, maintained by Information department and General Administration Department (GAD), also show outdated information about the council of ministers and the administrative set-up. Eight new districts were created in the state during the chief ministership of Ghulam Nabi Azad in 2006.
The districts that have not been mentioned in the website are: Shopian, Kulgam, Bandipora and Ganderbal in Kashmir division; and Kishtwar, Ramban, Reasi and Samba in Jammu division. According to the official website www.jammukashmir.nic.in, the Omar Abdullah-led council of ministers has not been expanded after it was sworn in on January 5, 2009. The council of ministers was, however, expanded to include 13 more faces in July last year.
The present strength of the council is 22. Then again, Finance Minister Abdul Rahim Rather continues to hold charge of Law and Parliamentary affairs, a portfolio given to Rural Development Minister Ali Mohammad Sagar after the expansion of the ministry in July 2009. The official website of General Administration Department, a department directly under the charge of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, is full of old information about officials heading the Kashmir division and several district administrations in the state.
It says Naseema Lankar is still the divisional commissioner of Kashmir division. However, the officer was transferred as Commissioner Secretary in the School Education department in August. Two deputy commissioners have served in Kargil district in Ladakh region of the state since Riyaz Ahmad Sheikh relinquished the post in 2009. However, the GAD website still has Sheikh listed as the head of the district administration. The incumbent is N Raju who had taken over from Satish Nehru recently. M K Dwivedi was elevated to the rank of secretary during a cabinet meeting in October and posted in the department of Information Technology, while Deputy Commissioner Leh Sanjeev Verma was posted in his place as deputy commissioner Jammu.
While Dwivedi continues to be listed as deputy commissioner of Jammu, Verma is shown as deputy commissioner of Kathua -- a post he held before being transferred to Leh for overseeing the elections of the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council -- on the website. M S Sheikh is the acting deputy commissioner Kathua but finds no mention on the official website. The website maintained by the Kashmir Divisional Commissioner's office has the newly created districts mentioned on it, but there is no information about the geography, demography or administration on the links to these districts.
(Courtesy : www.hindustantimes.com, 21/11/2010)
Karan echoes Omar, but ‘J&K part of India’
Jammu: Facing flak for his remarks on accession of Jammu and Kashmir with India, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Friday got support from an unexpected quarter — senior Congress leader and former sadar-e-riyast Dr Karan Singh. Singh said the state had acceded to India and not merged with it and that it why it has its own separate constitution and special status. The statement assumes significance as Singh is son of the last Dogra ruler of Jammu and Kashmir, Maharaja Hari Singh — who signed the Instrument of Accession on October 26, 1947 — and also because he was the state’s first and last sadar-e-riyast. “The factual position is that the Instrument of Accession signed by my father Maharaja Hari Singh was the same as signed by other states. However, after that other states ended in merger with India, but Jammu Kashmir did not merge with it as it had its own separate constitution. That is why the state has special status and Article 370,” Singh said.
(Courtesy : www.hindustantimes.com, 23/10/2010)
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